Four Fruits of Philosophy
Some high-profile scientists say philosophy is useless — here are four reasons why philosophy is still important
Is Philosophy “Dead” in the Age of Science?
Big shot popularizers of science like Neil deGrasse Tyson are known for making disparaging comments about philosophy and its relevance in the 21st century. He said,
“Yeah, if you are distracted by your questions so that you can’t move forward, you are not being a productive contributor to our understanding of the natural world.”
That’s philosophy in a nutshell to a lot of people: “being distracted by stupid questions”. Who needs it?
In a certain sense, I am sympathetic to this attitude. Indeed, I just recently shared an article on Medium about why I think academic philosophy is bankrupt.
While I share Wittgenstein’s opinion that most academic philosophical research is just nonsense, I nevertheless contend that teaching philosophy classes is an important civic function and philosophy itself is simply a part of what it means to be human, to have big brains with a lot of thoughts that need organizing and confronted with a reality that requires understanding.
However, although I am happy I left academic philosophy to pursue my writing career, I still get a little…
